As the Biden administration rolled out new changes to speed up the asylum review process, the Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF) voiced its concerns that the new rules enable those who want to take advantage of the system.
Ken Oliver, TPPF’s senior director of engagement and right on immigration, said in a TPPF newsletter that the changes have good intentions, but could be problematic as more people attempt to cross the nation’s Southern border.
“We may grant that several thousands of those cases, even several tens of thousands on the entire docket, are those of people with legitimate claims to facing deadly political, religious, ethnic or race-related persecution in their home countries,” Oliver said in the newsletter. “But the vast majority are simply using the façade of an asylum claim as the easiest means to obtain a fresh start in the U.S.”
President Joe Biden has already started to implement a plan to overhaul the asylum system at the U.S.-Mexico border, shifting the responsibilities to asylum officers rather than immigration judges to determine who will be allowed to stay in the U.S., The Washington Post reported. The first two centers to test these changes are located in the Lone Star State.
The Biden Administration said the adjustments are aimed at reducing court backlogs and expediting the disqualification process, the Post reported. Immigration judges will be handling claims denied by asylum officers.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton filed an injunction recently in an effort to stop the asylum rule change from taking effect, Fox News reported.
“The Biden Administration has made it clear that they do not want to abide by the Constitution or the rules and regulations set by Congress, especially regarding the Texas border,” Paxton said in a release. “Federal law requires genuine asylum and parole claims to be carefully managed and scrutinized by an immigration judge, not a bureaucrat rubber-stamping patently false claims. Not only that, but this entire Rule is just a way for this Administration to accomplish their real goal: a mass influx of illegal aliens into the United States. I’m asking the court to put a stop to the Rule before it goes into effect.”
